of waiting

naked. i sit in the bathroom, waiting for my needs to dry and shrivel so that I can take control of my breath again and proceed with my shower. listening to Cyndi Lauper, i wait. i am merging with my immediate emptiness. yet, I keep on waiting…

waiting for things to normalise back to their abnormality. waiting for that dairy milk cake to rise and collapse and harden and soften with time. waiting for ice cubes to melt and burn my tongue further and blister. waiting for the pain to recede and waiting for it to come back. waiting for the silence before the scream to extinguish itself and waiting for the impending scream to crack open the earth. waiting for the food to pass the intestinal tract and waiting for the next unsatisfactory meal.

waiting for the room to start becoming my skin and enclosing my wronged limbs and waiting for it to break me to nothing. waiting for the world to open a star-shaped space for me and fill me with moonlight. waiting for my heart to collapse beneath the weight of my consuming world. waiting for the hunchback sky to turn into that particular hibiscus-red and fall down on me. waiting for the heat to penetrate my shadow skull and open flowerless graves within. waiting for a song that would escape my lips and take my voice and bury it into the ploughed riverbed. waiting to be kissed by a nightmare and fucked by an inconsequential god.

waiting for the wait to end.

.
© Anmol Arora

Image source (Tyeb Mehta (b. 1925) Diagonal Series signed and dated ‘Tyeb 76’ (on reverse) oil on canvas 44 x 35 in. (111.8 x 90.2 cm.))

 

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on normalcy

Michael Hensley Paintings, Human Figure 3

who can verify the cost/revenue of this departure
from personhood?

i can see the light waves on the spectrum
of my performance — my silhouette & skin
are linked with an intransigent belief that
i am not alright or enough to be seen/heard.

the pain of birth leaves marks on my face,
small and insignificant, and still relevant
to my image seen in the deep recesses of
your unwavering eyes. i see how you see me —

an anomaly, an unnatural product of
your imagination,
an offensive form, a mouth drawn by
your discomfort.

i am paying my debt to this earth and its sentient
beings, by giving myself up and away, little by
little, piece by piece,

letting go of my (un)acknowledged/embellished/performed
body before it becomes dust & rain and fear & shame.

.
© Anmol Arora
Also read on self-sabotaging, on panic, and on loneliness

Linking it up with The Tuesday Platform at With Real Toads, where Sanaa is hosting this week with an introduction to the poetics of Marilyn Hacker